Stephen Cruz and The Mexican American Dream

For the longest time Cruz naively believes in the American Dream and believes it is real, it is possible. He then begins to work in white collar America and sees the racial tensions and inequality for every minority. Cruz’s point is he didn’t even know he was being discriminated, just bad people. He also realized that minorities are just as bad o each other as whites are to minorities. In his businesses he could only go so high, and even then it was not because he was wanted for his skill, but for the fact that he was Mexican. Cruz’s narrative here is rhetoric even if not explicit rhetoric. His argument is strong in that it seems as though he is almost just contemplating to himself, baffled at what happened. He doesn’t tell you explicitly what to think or believe about the American dream, in fact he doesn’t even mention the American dream. He is simply telling you what happened, what he has done. Of course, he really is trying to prove a point but he does it in a subtle way. He give you these examples of racism in the job, moving up the ladder only because they needed a minority, tells us how he kept moving up though, questioning what he was doing. he ends the narrative with a punch. He left. He quit and is teaching in Wisconsin. He tells you the American dream is “confused”. He moved up but lost some of himself in the process. His point is different from many of the ones we have already heard in this class. He moved up achieved all he had ever dreamed of achieving and yet it wasn’t what he thought it would be. He makes it sound almost as if he got lucky. Lucky in that they needed a Mexican partner, there he was. He happened to be the most qualified at the moment so they picked him. Cruz makes this personal and uses pathos as a great outlet for his agument.